Living on the Street

It is hard to be homeless. You have no place to be alone. You have no place to lay your head at night. You have no place to store your stuff. You are dependent on others for food. Sometimes, you have no place to go to the bathroom. You go months without a good night’s sleep. It is cold or hot or raining like crazy. You have no privacy – no private place to have an argument with a friend, to cry with your head in your hands, to just have a bad day. Yet, you are ignored by most. Some people avoid your eye contact, don’t respond to you when you ask them a question, or act like you are completely invisible. It is stressful to be homeless.

What are our expectations of people experiencing homelessness? Some people expect gratitude and grace at even the smallest offering. Some expect peaceful connection all the time. Some suggest that homeless people should be out of sight.

What is reasonable? What is compassionate?

Here are some articles that have considered these questions:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/31/us/31keywest.html – an article about Key West in the NY Times

http://www.radioproject.org/2010/12/how-%E2%80%98quality-of-life%E2%80%99-turned-homeless-new-yorkers-into-criminals/ – a response to New York City’s ‘quality of life’ laws

http://www.streetnewsservice.org/news/2011/april/feed-274/homeless-arrests-rise,-solutions-slow-to-come.aspx – a piece on Nashville’s response to homelessness

http://www.nationalhomeless.org/publications/crimreport/introduction.html – national report on the criminalization of homelessness

http://www.sandiego.gov/police/prevention/homeless.shtml - San Diego Police Department’s advice on how to deal with homeless people

http://nashvillecitypaper.com/content/city-news/homeless-advocates-attempt-improve-uneasy-relationship-citys-criminal-justice-syst  – article on a task force created in Nashville to advise on police/homeless relations

http://www.civic-strategies.com/onlib/lessons/07.html – a straightforward editorial on what works

This is clearly not an easy issue but it is one that deserves our time and energy. Please start a conversation with your family, friends and neighbors. Find out what they think it is the right community response to homelessness and to those experiencing homelessness. Ask them what you can do and they can do to continue this conversation. Let’s figure this out together.

Tags: compassion, homeless. haven, panhandling, quality of life, solutions

This entry was posted on July 11, 2011 at 5:05 pm and is filed under Ending Homelessness. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.